Party games are games which share several features suitable to entertaining a social gathering of moderate size. The article below will cover a brief description of what games are and then a list of the most popular party games. Use this as a guide for planning your next holiday party.

Party games are games that some people play as forms of entertainment at social gatherings. Party games usually involve more than one player. There are a large number and styles of party games available and the one selected will depend on the atmosphere that is sought to be generated. The party game may merely be intended as an ice breaker, or the sole purpose for the party.

" The number of participants is flexible and fairly large." "Traditional multiplayer board games tend to accommodate four to six players at most, whereas party games generally have no fixed upper limit." "Some games become unwieldy if more than twelve or fifteen play, but even for these the upper limit is flexible." "Many party games such as Charades simply divide everyone into two or more roughly equal teams, while others like Werewolf give each individual a role and the object of each player becomes to play the role."

"Cooperation between players is encouraged. Very few successful party games are scored individually; most games that involve a score to determine the winner are team-based, and others such as role-plays are not usually scored in the traditional sense.

"The players can take part at varying levels." "Not everyone enjoys straining themselves to the utmost to win, so good party games have multiple ways to play along and contribute to everyone's enjoyment." For example,

In Fictionary not everyone needs to create plausible dictionary definitions; humorous submissions are at least as welcome.

In Charades, players can actively participate in guessing without taking a turn at acting.

Team Based Games

"Players do not have to wait for long periods before participating." "Games in which every player has their own turn can become boring with a large group, especially if a turn takes a long time to complete." "Team-based games are ideal for this very reason; with two, three or four teams of four or five players each, the wait time is severely reduced as compared to twenty turns per round.

"The game has entertainment value for spectators." "Many party games involve at least some level of humor, whether inherent in the game or introduced by players." "In this way, players not taking a turn can still enjoy the gameplay."

Player elimination is rare

"Monopoly makes a poor party game, because bankrupt players must sit out while the remaining players continue to the game's conclusion, which can take several hours." "In contrast, no matter how far behind a team is in Pictionary, all players can participate until the very end."

"The amount of specialized equipment needed is not dependent on the number of players." ""Common-hand"" Liar's Dice (also known as Perudo), though it can technically be played by an unlimited number of people, usually becomes totally infeasible beyond about a dozen players." "The game generally needs five dice and a dice cup for each player; with 12 players this requires a staggering 60 dice, which very few other games will require." "By contrast, Yahtzee needs only one set of dice regardless of the number of players, thus it has no equipment-based limit on players (though it does have other practical limits)." "This disadvantage can often be mitigated through coordination with invitees to bring additional supplies as may be necessary, and often the supplies are inexpensive to procure."

"The game usually does not involve spending real money." "Players should not have to buy something, especially if that thing is a single-use item other than food, in order to participate in the game." "Sometimes this is a rule of the game; scavenger hunts generally disqualify players caught buying items on the list." "However, there are exceptions; a "casino night" with a token buy-in for charity or to help pay expenses is usually acceptable to most casual invitees." "A targeted audience, such as gamblers or the well-to-do, may pay more considerable sums to participate."